Some organizations believe there are at least two possible approaches to ensuring staff have the right skills to compete in their chosen industries. A company can hire people with the skills the organization needs, or they can train the employees they have with the skills the organization needs.
Many companies, buying into the idea of these two distinct options, believe it’s less hassle to forego a robust training department and rely instead on recruitment. “Why spend resources training someone with the skills I need, when I can hire someone who someone else has already trained for me?”
Ignore Training at Your Own Risk
The problem is that the approach that foregoes an internal training department and focuses on hiring ideal candidates effectively assumes a static industry and economy. Skills that were relevant and in demand today could be obsolete tomorrow. Imagine hiring the best typewriter maintenance personnel at the dawn of the personal computer age.
This doesn’t mean that employees can’t adapt to changing circumstances and technologies, but it’s a lot harder for them to do that on their own than it is with a dedicated and effective training department.
“The quickly changing environment places a greater emphasis on the need for the workforce to continue to acquire new skills,” writes Gaurav Gupta in an article for Forbes.
New Skills Always in Demand
“Businesses that invest in learning and development opportunities better prepare their employees to adapt and innovate, which will create a competitive advantage. Investing in professional development can also set employers apart as they compete for talent,” Gupta writes. “Those that prioritize upskilling initiatives are well-positioned to not only attract and retain employees but also unleash their potential.”
Companies that can quickly identify changing needs for various competencies and develop and deliver training to staff in order to develop the competencies for which there is the greatest need are likely to outperform their counterparts. But in a dynamic environment in which the key skills for success are constantly changing, it’s not realistic for companies to try to acquire needed skills from hiring alone.
Lin Grensing-Pophal is a Contributing Editor at HR Daily Advisor.
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